The present invention generally relates to telecommunications services for the hearing and speech impaired. Yet more particularly, the present invention relates to systems and methods for providing relay center services to the hearing and speech impaired via the Internet or other interactive network.
Title IV of the Americans with Disabilities Act of 1990 requires the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) to ensure that telecommunications services are provided to the hearing and speech impaired. In furtherance of this requirement, telecommunications service providers currently provide Telecommunications Relay Services (TRS), or relay centers, as a functional equivalent of telecommunications services for the hearing and speech impaired. Relay centers have been used to provide telecommunications access to hearing- and speech-impaired people on a nationwide basis since 1983.
Relay centers operate in the following manner. A calling party for this system may be a hearing- or speech-impaired person or a non-impaired person wishing to talk to the hearing- or speech-impaired person.
In a case where the calling party is a hearing- or speech-impaired person, the calling party uses a Telecommunication Device for the Deaf (TDD), such as a Teletypewriter (TTY), for transmitting and receiving typed messages during a call. The calling party places a call to a relay center by dialing a local toll free telephone number. The call is received in the relay center and directed via a switching system to a communication assistant terminal in the relay center. The call is a modem connection between the calling party and the communication assistant terminal. The calling party then types a telephone number of a non-impaired person that the calling party desires to call. The communication assistant then places a call to the non-impaired person at the desired telephone number. When the call is established with the non-impaired party, the communication assistant acts to relay the call between the calling party and the called party. The calling party types in messages which are read by the communication assistant, who then speaks the messages to the called party. Accordingly, the called party speaks messages to the communication assistant, who in turn types in the called party's messages to be read by the calling party. This operation is performed in an opposite manner when a non-impaired person calls a hearing- or speech-impaired person.
In a conventional relay center, the switching system is connected to a modem in each of the communication assistant terminals and to a call controller. One type of switching system typically used in a call center is a Rockwell Galaxy ACD switch. The call controller is a system having a processing unit and associated memory.
The call controller determines which communication assistant terminal is available to handle a call. When the switching system receives a request for a communication assistant, the switching system transmits a request to the call controller for an available terminal. The call controller responds to the switching system by transmitting an identity of an available communication assistant terminal. The switching system then extends the call to the identified communication assistant terminal.
Each communication assistant terminal includes a computer system that can convert signals received via modem into a text message that is displayed upon a screen. Each terminal also has a telephone station connected to the switching system to receive and to place voice telephonic calls. The communication assistant can enter text into the computer system via a keyboard. The computer system converts the entered text into text messages transmitted to a calling party over the connection established by the modem. The computer is also connected to a network. When a call is completed to a terminal, a Call Detail Record (CDR) is generated by the computer system. The call detail record includes information pertaining to the length of the call. The CDR is then stored by the computer system.
A billing system is connected to each terminal via a network. Periodically, each computer system transmits stored CDRs to the billing system for processing. The billing system then uses the CDRs to generate billing.
Currently, a hearing- or speech-impaired person is limited to making and receiving calls through a TDD access device, which is fixed to its location. While some public telephones, such as those found in airports, are equipped with TDD capabilities, a hearing- or speech-impaired person is generally limited to calling from a TDD device located in their home. In addition, some telephone services available to non-impaired users, such as digital cellular and mobile phone service, are not currently available to hearing- and speech-impaired users. Thus, hearing- and speech-impaired people are greatly restricted in their mobility and by their dependence on TDD devices.
Further, current relay centers provide only a limited number of features. These features are generally restricted to those identified above. A hearing- or speech-impaired person cannot currently actively participate in a conference call or have a multi-party phone conversation. One reason for these limitations is that TDD uses a half-duplex protocol. Even for a person-to-person conversation, the half-duplex protocol limits the interaction between the callers, as one party cannot interrupt or interject when the other party is speaking/typing.
Accordingly, there is a need to provide a hearing- or speech-impaired person with more flexible access to telecommunications service and, thus, eliminate the hearing impaired person's dependency on a TDD device. There is a further need to provide a hearing- or speech-impaired person with access to conference calls and multi-party calls.